The father of the Argentine Constitution, Juan Bautista Alberdi in his book ”The Crime of War” written in 1872 states that ”wars will be rarer as responsibility for their effects is felt by all those who promote and incite them”.
By: Germán Gorraiz López, Political analyst
This is anticipated almost a century at the end of the nuclear escalation that had its turning point in the Cuban Missile Crisis and culminated in the signing by Kennedy and Khrushchev of the Nuclear Test Suspension Agreement (1962) and the implementation of the Doctrine of Peaceful Coexistence.
However, after the Ukrainian conflict, we witnessed the return of the Cold War between Russia and the US (Cold War 2.0), the withdrawal of the US. of the INF Treaty and the consequent revival of the nuclear race.
NATO and the Doctrine of Containment
Joe Biden’s harsh statements about Russia (”Putin is a war criminal”) and the implementation of sanctions to achieve the economic suffocation and financial starvation of Russia following the Ukrainian conflict have staged the arrival of Cold War 2.0 and the return of the geopolitical thesis of George Kennan, known as the Doctrine of Containment.
The foundations of this doctrine were laid by George F. Kennan in his essay ”Sources of Soviet Behavior” published in the journal Foreign Affairs in 1947 and whose main ideas are summarized in the quote ”Soviet power is impervious to the logic of reason but very sensitive to the logic of force”.
Furthermore, following the increase in NATO military forces with new battalions deployed on the European border with Russia, we witnessed the violation of the 1997 NATO-Russia Founding Act by which NATO ruled out ”the permanent stationing of a substantial and additional contingent of combat troops in Eastern Europe” as well as the recent entry of Sweden and Finland into NATO military structures and the fifth phase of deployment of a missile shield in Europe (Euro DAM).
Will Kaliningrad be the epicentre of the new Missile Crisis?
Due to its geographical position, the province of Kaliningrad is an ideal platform for means of electronic espionage and missile batteries aimed at controlling and neutralizing possible hostile actions by the US, which makes him the target of a preemptive first strike.
Thus, the former NATO commander-in-chief in Europe, James Stavridis, in an article published in Bloomberg, describes Kaliningrad as ”a geographical corner between Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the rest of NATO”, so it is necessary:
”the neutralization of Kaliningrad in the event that the conflict with Russia breaks out so that the corridor of Suwalki, which borders the border between Lithuania and Poland, do not fall under the control of Moscow”.
Following the start by the US in May 2016 of the fifth phase of the deployment of the anti-missile shield in Europe (Euro DAM) with the entry into service of the anti-ballistic defence system Aegis Ashore at the base of Deveselu (Romania), just 600 km from the Crimean peninsula, Russia proceeded to install in Kaliningrad the missiles Iskander equipped with multipurpose warheads as well as anti-aircraft missiles S-400 with what in the words of the political scientist Vladimir Abrémov ”the province of Kaliningrad will again play the role of pistol in the temple of Europe as two decades ago”.
Likewise, Putin in a message to the Federal Assembly, issued a warning to NATO:
”Russia could also use the hypersonic missile Tsirkon with a speed of Mach 8 and launched from submarines could reach any US Command Center in five minutes as well as the cruise missile Burevestnik and the nuclear submarine drone Poseidon”.
However, Biden’s geopolitical short-sightedness in his obsession with subjugating Russia will increase his anger with Putin and if after the entry of Sweden and Finland into NATO the exit of Kaliningrad to the Baltic Sea be closed, could be reissued the Kennedy-Khrushchev Missile Crisis (October 1962) which would have as its epicentre Kaliningrad.
By: Germán Gorraiz López, Political analyst